`LILIES OF THE FIELD' BLOOM FOREVER AND EVER

Dear sister Anna:

I have saved all your letters to me since you moved south to Bethlehem so long ago. They have been so precious to me. I know that writing materials do not come easy. But far more precious are the words you put upon the papyrus. They are like jewels in a crown. In re-reading the letters, from time to time, I can detect a central theme that ties them all together. It is not how we make our honey cakes, dye our thread or weave our cloth. It is mention of the Galilean called Jesus. I suspect you will find this common thread in my letters too.

I know that our lives have been on the periphery of events surrounding Jesus' life, and I have lived right here on the lake where he spent much time here and over at Capernaum. Sometimes I wish I had dropped everything to follow him as have Mary and Salome.

I have your letter, longer than most, telling me of those stirring events in Bethlehem, almost 33 years ago, when all those strange happenings occurred there the shepherds and their stories and the Magi. That was the beginning of the thread that has bound our letters together whether we've been aware of it or not.

You told me of the time when, in Jerusalem for another Passover, you spoke to a couple who was desperately seeking for their son who had become lost in the vast comings and goings and later you heard that this lost one was the boy Jesus who had been born on that strange night in Bethlehem.

I know that, much later on, I told you about the time I heard him speak. He was sitting atop a hill. His Disciples were at his feet and others from nearby, when they heard he was speaking, hastened up the hillside to hear too. I was among them. It was a sunshiny day. Barley was ripe. We could see it in the fields below. Breezes from the south rippled through it, making tan waves in contrast to the blue waves of the lake.

Anna, I know I've told you about this before, but I feel that I have not adequately described the feeling that came over me as I listened to him. Probably I'll never be able to. Where are the words? I think what he was saying was a summary of all the things he had been teaching around Galilee and Judea. As he spoke I seemed to be caught up in some ethereal level above the crowd where all things seemed right in order and everlasting. His words fell upon my ears like raindrops on the Negev. "Happy are you if you long to be just and good," he said, and from my position up there in that intangible, seemingly celestial level, an indescribable peace caught and tangled in my mind and heart. "Happy are those who strive for peace." "I came to fulfill the prophets." "You are fortunate if you are meek and lowly." "Don't worry about your clothes, look at the field lilies." On and on he spoke, unrehearsed and with such authority one would never doubt he is who he says he is, the Messiah. I saw a Roman Legionnaire sitting not far away and he just shook his head in amazement and bowed before Jesus when he had finished.

Birds were flying about and I tell you, Anna, it seemed as if they were flying below me. The lilies he spoke of were blooming and I could look down on them, look right down into the throats of them and see not only their waxen beauty but the provisions made for their everlasting.

He repeated a phrase over and over, "The Kingdom of Heaven," and it came to me that that was where I was, in another kingdom superimposed on the world and it was the real place. I was, of course, sitting on the ground as were others, shading my eyes the better to see as the sunbeams reflected from bronzed faces and glistening beards, but at the same time I was in this other place.

Oh, Anna, it is so hard for me to explain the ineffable beauty and peace of moving about in that realm although there is Caesar and his laws and Moses' laws to obey, but in this Kingdom, you are free and bound only by silvery strings of love, soft and unchafing as the beast feathers of a dove. If you do not know, you do not know.

I cannot say that I maintain that upper level all the time. There are days when, going after the water, you hear ominous tales of what is going to happen to this Jesus and you drop down to Caesar's world to wonder if there is anything you can do to stop it. I know that could I ascend to this upper level at will I would not worry. There is no worry there. Did I mention that?

I shall not be able to come to Passover this year, but my neighbors, James and John, sons of Zebedee, will be there. I hope that if you get to go, you will be able to identify them, especially John, and send me a quicker message as to what happens than I would otherwise get.

Remember how we used to hold our crying babies and whisper in their ears, "It's all right?" They believed it and for them it was and they were happy again. The feeling in this kingdom is something like that. This Passover Week I'm going to hold that thought. You do it too.

Your sister,

Rachel

REJOICE!